Social software for music

Tese de mestrado integrado. Engenharia Informática e Computação. Faculdade de Engenharia. Universidade do Porto. 200

Intelligent Avatar on E-Learning using Facial Expression and Haptic

 The process of introducing emotion can be improved through three-dimensional (3D) tutoring system. The problem that still not solved is how to provide realistic tutor (avatar) in virtual environment. This paper  propose an approach to teach children on understanding emotion sensation through facial expression and sense of touch (haptic).The algorithm is created by calculating constant factor (f) based on maximum value of RGB and magnitude force then magnitude force range will be associated into particular colour. The Integration process will be started from rendering the facial expression then followed by adjusting the vibration power to emotion value. The result that achieved on experiment, it show around 71% students agree with the classification of magnitude force into emotion representation. Respondents commented that high magnitude force create similar sensation when respondents feel anger, while low magnitude force is more relaxing to respondents. Respondents also said that haptic and facial expression is very interactive and realistic

Biosignal controlled recommendation in entertainment systems

With the explosive growth of the entertainment contents and the ubiquitous access of them via fixed or mobile computing devices, recommendation systems become essential tools to help the user to find the right entertainment at the right time and location. I envision that by integrating the bio signal input into the recommendation process, it will help the users not only to find interesting contents, but also to increase one’s comfort level by taking into account the biosginal feedback from the users. The goal of this project was to develop a biosignal controlled entertainment recommendation system that increases the user’s comfort level by reducing the level of stress. As the starting point, this project aims to contribute to the field of recommendation systems with two points. The first is the mechanism of embedding the biosignal non-intrusively into the recommendation process. The second is the strategy of the biosignal controlled recommendation to reduce stress. Heart rate controlled in-flight music recommendation is chosen as its application domain. The hypothesis of this application is that, the passenger's heart rate deviates from the normal due to unusual long haul flight cabin environment. By properly designing a music recommendation system to recommend heart rate controlled personalized music playlists to the passenger, the passengers' heart rate can be uplifted, down-lifted back to normal or kept within normal, thus their stress can be reduced. Four research questions have been formulated based on this hypothesis. After the literature study, the project went mainly through three phases: framework design, system implementation and user evaluation to answer these research questions. During the framework design phase, the heart rate was firstly modeled as the states of bradycardia, normal and tachycardia. The objective of the framework is that, if the user's heart rate is higher or lower than the normal heart rate, the system recommends a personalized music playlist accordingly to transfer the user’s heart rate back to normal, otherwise to keep it at normal. The adaptive framework integrates the concepts of context adaptive systems, user profiling, and the methods of using music to adjust the heart rate in a feedback control system. In the feedback loop, the playlists were composed using a Markov decision process. Yet, the framework allows the user to reject the recommendations and to manually select the favorite music items. During this process, the system logs the interactions between the user and the system for later learning the user’s latest music preferences. The designed framework was then implemented with platform independent software architecture. The architecture has five abstraction levels. The lowest resource level contains the music source, the heart rate sensors and the user profile information. The second layer is for resource management. In this layer are the manager components to manage the resources from the first layer and to modulate the access from upper layers to these resources. The third layer is the database, acting as a data repository. The fourth layer is for the adaptive control, which includes the user feedback log, the inference engine and the preference learning component. The top layer is the user interface. In this architecture, the layers and the components in the layers are loosely coupled, which ensures the flexibility. The implemented system was used in the user experiments to validate the hypothesis. The experiments simulated the long haul flights from Amsterdam to Shanghai with the same time schedule as the KLM flights. Twelve subjects were invited to participate in the experiments. Six were allocated to the controlled group and others were allocated to the treatment group. In addition to a normal entertainment system for the control group, the treatment group was also provided with the heart rate controlled music recommendation system. The experiments results validated the hypothesis and answered the research questions. The passenger's heart rate deviates from normal. In our user experiments, the passenger's heart rate was in the bradycardia state 24.6% of time and was in the tachycardia state 7.3% of time. The recommended uplifting music reduces the average bradycardia state duration from 14.78 seconds in the control group to 6.86 seconds in the treatment group. The recommended keeping music increases the average normal state duration from 24.66 seconds in the control group to 29.79 seconds in the treatment group. The recommended down-lifting music reduces the average tachycardia state duration from 13.89 seconds in the control group to 6.53 seconds in the treatment group. Compared to the control group, the stress of the treatment group has been reduced significantly

(Re) Membering Forwards : Excavating and Embodying Cultural Memory, An Afro-Diasporic Dance Film Rendition

The Afro-Indigenous diasporic body as a repository of imprinted memory and space of embodied knowledge cradles this written body of work and work of the body action research thesis (Re) Membering Forwards: Excavating and Embodying Cultural Memory. My autobiographical memory account looks back while going forward as an applied creative praxis and collaborative process a rich interwoven layering of embodied response emerges as an Afro-flamenco choreography. A key feature of my process was in rooting my work through the lens of diasporic thinking and embodied questioning. With the aim of identifying and articulating how coexisting aesthetic codes emerge, the body as text revealed profound cultural memories. By engaging with and within varied environments (spaces and places) an employed methodology, temporal codes of embodied understanding were intuitively amplified. Through this interactive work (from studio to on location film shoots), I have deepened my understanding of the confluence between materiality and immateriality within specific spaces